Ten Essential Android Tablet Apps (Honeycomb)

Android tablets like the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1″ don’t have the huge app catalog that you find on the iPad, but that doesn’t mean you have to go app-less when you use a slick Android tablet.

The team at GottaBeMobile has put our heads together to come up with the essential Android Honeycomb apps you shouldn’t work or play without. We’ll be adding to our top apps as more Android Honeycomb apps are released.

For now, enjoy the enhanced productivity and increased fun that these apps bring to your Android tablet.

Productivity

I wouldn’t dream of typing more than a sentence on an Android tablet without the SwiftKey Tablet X keyboard. SwiftKey deliver the very needed split keyboard to Android Honeycomb tablets, which tend to be wider than the iPad. You also get cloud based personalization of words, next work prediction that is eerily accurate and more.

If you need to edit Office documents on your Honeycomb tablet, Docs to Go by Dataviz is still the best game in town. You can download a free viewer app on your device to read Word, PowerPoint, Excel and PDF files, but if you want to get to work editing them, you’ll need the $15 license key. You can also connect to Google Docs for access to your cloud based files.

I never use a mobile device without Evernote installed. This note taking app will let you share and sync notes across a variety of devices and can even be used to manage to do lists and grocery lists. Most of the time I am adding images, short notes and interesting links to Evernote on tablets. The new Evernote for Android tablets version of the app brings some nice features along, and makes better use of bigger displays.

Forget the basic browser on your Android tablet and upgrade to the Dolphin HD browser. This browser offers a full tabbed browsing experience, theme support, a sidebar to launch add ons and much more. You can even set your User Agent, so that you get the full version of websites instead of scaled down mobile sites. You can also check out the tablet beta version, Dolphin Browser for Tab.

Entertainment

Pulse brings you the latest news, humor and more in a beautiful looking package. The Pulse reader app has access to feeds from many websites and news services as well as the ability to connect to Google Reader so you can pull in your own stories. I’m still wishing for Zite for Android tablets, but Pulse is still a must have.

If you buy into the Google Music landscape, then you need the Google Music app for your Android tablet. After you upload all of your music to Google’s servers, you can play back your entire collection from anywhere with an Internet connection. You can also download playlists for offline playback. Much nicer than plugging in to your computer.

If you want to read books and magazines, the Nook app is where it’s at. While ebooks readers are still up to personal preference, the new Nook App, with full screen color magazines is beautiful. While Zinio is hit or miss on readable article text, the Nook app can be counted on to deliver readable magazines.

If you love comics, then the Comixology app is a must download. Even if you have fallen out of love with graphic novels and comic book heroes, the portability of your comic collection may bring you back. Comics by Comixology has access to comics from DC, Image, IDW, Archie and more. you can read comics online and on your other devices, like the iPhone or iPad.

Games

Fruit Ninja is a fun slice and dice game that is a great time waster. Slice fruit in half as time ticks down to try to get the high score, but watch out for bombs. This game is fun on the small screen and much more fun on the big screen. There is also a free version of Fruit Ninja.

It’s impossible to pass on Angry Birds. Even if you only play it a few times, this free and fun game is a must have app on any tablet. Instead of paying for the app like iPad users, score the free ad-supported app on the Android Market. Choose from Angry Birds, Angry Birds Rio and Angry Birds Seasons for loads of bird flinging, pig smashing fun.

Organization

If you want to organize your home screen on Android into folders, like iOS, you need Folder Organizer. This handy app allows you to create folders of similar apps so that you can clean up your home screen and better organize your apps. Once you get the hang of setting up your folders, which can be a bit tricky, you’ll enjoy faster access to your favorite apps. There is also a free version.

I am glad you guys are showing off real tablet apps instead of ones that just scale. I think that people need to understand that just because an app scales to fit a tablet doesn’t mean its a tablet app. A tablet app is one that uses the entire real estate of the tablet and presents a different UI than what a regular app does. Right now, the point is, its hard to find these apps but I actually came across this website on XDA its called http://tablified.com. I guess its suppose to be like the missing tablet app section for the android market but hey, call it whatever you want-it works. the apps that are put up are 100% FOR TABLETS! non of that scaling to fit BS, they’re TRUE tablet apps. I’ll keep using this till google gets their act together.

Try mybook personal organizer which is optimized for honeycomb tablets. It has great productivity tools – calendar, task lists, contacts, and notes. It can export and import, password protection and a nice search feature. The lite version is free. Cheers.

This post will remain relevant for a very long time. why because so many Android Tablets are and will continue to ship with Honeycomb and not Android 4.0 ICS.
Honeycomb android operating systems being installed by manufacturers is mixed.
Which Android Honeycomb Tablets tah will get the iCS Upgrade is still not %100 set.
In any event thanks for the list